INDEFENSIBLE

Stunned CNN Host Blasts Trump for His Twisted Excuse for Sick MAGA Ad

Erin Burnett was floored by the president.

CNN’s Erin Burnett was left reeling after President Donald Trump went all in on defending one of the ugliest attack ads of the midterm election season.

On Thursday’s OutFront, Burnett, 50, played the president’s defense of Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign ad, which stars the estranged mother of the Republican’s Democratic rival, Amy Acton. Ramaswamy is running against Acton in the Ohio gubernatorial race.

The 60-second ad sees Acton’s estranged mother, Donna Arthur, call her daughter a “liar” and warns voters that she has “a serious problem” and “needs help.”

However, Arthur is accused of neglect and stood by her husband when Acton accused her stepfather, Cledith Arthur, of sexual assault when she was a young girl. Arthur was charged and indicted with the alleged rape in 1978. He pleaded not guilty, fled Ohio before trial, and died in 2004. He died a wanted man.

“Acton’s mother is the same woman, the same mother, who fled Ohio along with her husband after a grand jury indicted him for sexually abusing Acton when she was a child,” Burnett said pointedly.

“Yet, this is what the president of the United States said today,” she continued, before playing clips of Trump’s comments earlier Thursday.

“I know nothing about it,” Trump, 80, said while on his way to Iowa. “All I know is the mother said very bad things about Acton, who I guess is running for governor against Vivek, and all I can say is Vivek is great.”

In another clip, Burnett’s CNN colleague, Kaitlan Collins, asks Trump why he hadn’t mentioned the allegations against Acton’s stepfather. Trump said he had “no idea.”

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When quizzed on Acton’s accusations against her mother, he added, “Well, when did she make that statement? Was it just recently?” he asked. “All I know is Amy Acton’s mother said horrible things about Amy Acton.”

A stunned Burnett responded, ”that is an unbelievable exchange.”

She then turned to the president’s 400-plus-word Truth Social rant. In the post, Trump brought his late mother into the fight.

“If my mother, the legendary Mary MacLeod Trump, said anything bad about me, the Fake News would play it up,” Trump wrote, a sentiment he repeated when Collins pressed him later in the day.

Burnett read out another line in which, she said, Trump asked, “Who wouldn’t use such an ad? I would.”

“Well, that’s interesting,” she said. “So he just said that he would use an ad where someone whose husband was charged with raping their own daughter when she was under 12; he would use that ad. That’s incredible,” Burnett emphasized.

In the ad, Donna Arthur denies the allegations, calling her daughter a “liar,” and unfit for office.

Burnett turned to the growing list of Republicans speaking out against the ad, including Iowa Senate hopeful Ashley Hinson, who Trump was campaigning for in Iowa on Thursday night. Earlier, she told ABC News it should be taken down.

Burnett showed footage from Trump’s press briefing when Collins, 34, raised Hinson’s objection; Trump shrugged it off: “That’s her opinion.”

“Well, it’s her opinion,” Burnett shot back. “It’s also the opinion of many others, decent people.”

She ticked through the Ohio Republicans who have broken ranks. Gov. Mike DeWine called the ad “deeply troubling,” and Sen. Jon Husted said he would not run it.

“It’s putting Republicans in tight races in uncomfortable positions at a time when millions of people are already voting,” Burnett said, noting nearly 20 million ballots have been cast.

“This is what’s become Trump’s closing message,” she added. “With just 12 days before the election, defending an ad and saying that it’s so great he would run it, an ad using someone’s mother who fled the state with her husband after he was charged with raping her daughter.”

The fallout comes as Acton already holds a seven-point lead over Ramaswamy, 50 percent to 43 percent among likely voters, in a Marist poll taken Oct. 15–18.

The White House did not immediately respond to the Daily Beast’s request for comment.

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